Can 1836 be a hit where other soccer teams have missed?

How can Houston 1836 succeed where so many other soccer teams have floundered?

It’s not a loaded question. At least, not yet.

Major League Soccer’s web site has a detailed history of Houston’s pro and wannabe pro teams. It makes for depressing reading.

Here’s a glance at the who’s who (or more precisely who’s not anymore):

• 1967: The Houston Stars played during an era when the U.S. had two leagues: The United Soccer Association and the National Professional Soccer League. These two groups later formed the North American Soccer League. Meanwhile, the Houston Stars lasted all of one season.

• 1978-1979: The Houston Summit played in the Major Indoor Soccer League (MISL). The team later moved to Baltimore.

• 1978-1980:Houston Hurricane played in the NASL. Former Glasgow Celtic star Bobby Lennox played on this team.

• 1984:Houston Dynamo played in the United Soccer League, a league which co-existed with the NASL. The NASL folded in 1984 while USL made its exit in 1985.

• 1987: The Lone Star Soccer Alliance was founded and Houston Dynamo resurfaced. This team was later named the Houston Internationals. Another local team, the Houston Alliance joined the regional league in 1988. Both teams folded in 1991.

• 1988: The Houston Express played in the indoor United Soccer Leagues. This team folded after two seasons.

• 1995: The Puerto Rico Islanders of the USISL relocated here and played as the Houston Force, but folded midway through its maiden voyage.

• 1994-97 & 1999-2000: The Houston Hotshots played in two different professional indoor leagues.

• 1996-2000: The old NASL name Houston Hurricane returned for the team that played in the USISL Pro Select League.

• 2002-03: The amateur Houston Toros played in the Premier Development League (USL).

Enough already.

This historical tale of woe might be fodder for the naysayers, but don’t panic just yet. MLS can succeed here … Why? One crucial consideration: With the notable exception of the NASL’s Houston Hurricane, none of the above leagues/teams had anywhere close to the same national profile which MLS enjoys.

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Soccer can certainly succeed this time around. Even though soccer is still not at the forefront of American sports, it certainly has a much, much higher profile than it did in the NASL days. With U.S. successes in the World Cup (men and women), highly successful exhibitions and tournaments in Houston, a built-in rivalry with FCD, a unanimously acclaimed team name :-), decent TV coverage of soccer with ESPN, Spanish-language stations, and FSC – sure it can work. It’s even a really good team which has been inherited.

Go 1836! (I’ll be down from Austin for a game first chance that I get!)

This time yes, if all people in Houston get behind the team, including the futbol crazy latino population. I hope that happens and we can build a team that ALL of the great city of houston can be proud of! Go Houston 36′ers!

This team is going to capture Houston in a big way. Houston fans are hungry for a fun/lower cost/more interactive sports experience (rd more cheering/drinking/singing). Houstonians love a winner (Earthquakes have always been good). And most Houstonians I know (admittedly limited to inside the Loop Yuppies)love anything with a trendy “Euro” or foreign sheen to it. I don’t believe we should worry about catering to any specific racial demographic because the age and dollar demographics and numbers are so much larger and more compelling. In layman’s terms – there’s a ton of people in Houston and there’s not that many choices on where to spend your entertainment or sports dollars, no matter what your ethnic group. If you want sports in the summer it’s traditionally been Astros or nothing. We love the Astros, but Houston is such a bigger, more populous town than in the 70s and 80s, that Houston can easily support another sports option.

I’m hoping that 1836 will go over better than the old NASL Hurricane did in the ’70s – but a couple of minor corrections: the Stars played in the USA in 1967 and then in the NASL in 1968; and the Houston Force folded after their only game in 1995. My wife and I were among the select few to witness that game at Butler Stadium (and their head coach was CISL Hotshots’ ex-head coach Hernan “Chico” Borja).

As soon as MLS gets a schedule out for 1836, we’ll see when we can see the start of a new tradition – and maybe this one will stick, given two annual visits from FC Dallas…

I dont think this team will succeed at all. I give them two years and then they will be looking for another city to move just like all the other MLS teams that hop from city to city. First of all the name has not set well with the Hispanic community and it has gotten a lot of negative publicity and personally I think its a slap in the face. Most of you dont read the Spanish newspaper or hear what is going around in our community but let me tell you something if the promoters were ever looking to attract the Hispanic community they have failed because the stands are going to be filled with a couple of die hard MLS soccer fans and thats if they have a winning season. Look at what happened to the Texans this year they had a losing season and the stands were empty and thats the NFL imagine the MLS. Change the name and get a couple of high profile soccer players from Mexico and maybe that will draw a crowd. All the soccer games in Houston that have had large crowds and drawn publicity is not because of American players running the field its because of Mexican players. So, dont take credit for all the 40,000+ attendance when these people are mostly Hispanics that come to see these teams that are compose of Hispanic players. Its that simple. I speak from a different perspective because I know the people and talk to them everyday because I am among them and the reason why no one else has express something like this before its because my people are not going to waist there time on this message board inputting all this information because there to busy cutting your lawns, building your houses and washing your cars.

Well to reply to uhsoccer, the reason why fans stopped going to texans games was because they had a horrible team. I think houston sports fans are smart, they arent going to support a team which puts forth a bad product. So in that sense i dont necessarily blame the “fans” on not showing up for the Texans. Next I think soccer will succeed in houston. The reason being is that there is alot of soccer interest within this city. You have alot of the youth of the city playing soccer, you have a large hispanic populous, and also since this is a world cup year i think you’ll see a spot light on the sport in america which has never been seen before. So before you start bashing the name or about how hispanics wont even bother with the team, the positives in this case out weight the negatives. Also the simple point in this city is winning, if the team is competitive and wins people will show up, if they are lack luster then most fans wont even bother.

I think that 1836 will do well as a niche sporting event, much like the Aeros. If they can pull in as many people as the Aeros the first year they’ll be doing good. Houston has needed a good soccer team for a long long time now. The failure of the previous Houston teams had more to do with the leagues than apathy of fans. MLS is growing in the US, there is a market and it’s not just Latino.

The Dallas Burn (now FC Dallas) their first year (I was there) at the Cotton Bowl drew a mostly Latino crowd who were hungry for soccer in a major city. After a few years, with proper promotion and better play, plus a family friendly environment the crowd was much more diversified, which was good for the team, league and city. I don’t think that it will take that long in Houston. My 3 friends and I are all getting Season tickets and can’t wait for 4/1/06.

Uhsoccer’s comments above show a real lack of understanding about soccer and the “Hispanic” market. There are several different Latin American countries which are represented in Houston other than just Mexico.

El Salvador, Honduras, and Guatemala, to name a few make up quite a bit of the Hispanic soccer community here. According to UHsoccer, they too should be “offended” by the 1836 name. Don’t think so on that one. There are always going to be a few people trying to make a mountain out of a molehill and UHsoccer is trying his best. Anyone with any reasonable understanding knows where the name came from and what it means (the date of Houston’s founding).

As far as getting Hispanic players to attract the Hispanic community to 1836 matches, that won’t cut it either. The LA Galaxy tried that route with Luis Hernandez and it didn’t make one bit of difference. I guess it also means that every home game that Chivas USA has will be a sellout too huh? To say that 1836 needs to pander to the Hispanic community by bringing in a few players of Latin origin is just downright insulting. Hispanics will come because of quality of the futbol being played, not because of a few “marquee” players who are past it and are only here to pick up a paycheck. If we get Hispanic players in their prime who can help the team fantastic. Alejandro Moreno, already on the 1836 roster, comes to mind. Yes, MLS and the Houston 1836 will be successful. Whether UHSoccer and “the people he talks to everyday” want to participate, it’s entirely up to them.

You know uhsoccer, if you can’t get a simple fact right in your tirade, how do you expect us to believe anything else you say. I mean, to preach to us that everybody you talk to won’t be going to these games is hard to take as gospel when you claim that Houston will have to find a new city just like all those other MLS teams have had to. So I guess, if I look at this right, you are actually saying that everybody you talk to will actually be going to these games considering no other MLS has ever had to move to a new city. Yes, two others folded because of donkey head Douglas Logan’s inability to run a league with common sense, but since Garber has taken over, this league has made tremedous strides (see soccer specific stadia; $150 million deal with Adidas; Galaxy turning a profit; Veragas, Kroenke, MLSE, Checketts investing into the league; SUM marketing being formed; successful expansion, etc.). And to top it all off, the Earthquakes shouldn’t have been moved anyway!!! (But hey, our win, San Jose’s loss). So I guess my point is, if you really want people to take you seriously, get your facts and accusations correct, because if you don’t, you really don’t have much credibility on other so-called facts. And finally, to insult one group of people while defending another so-called insulted group is complete hypocrisy.